Before I begin I would like to throw out some things to the readers. I have been playing FIFA since I was a child. Remember the old school diagonal field back in FIFA ‘94? Yeah, that’s how long I have been playing. Second, soccer is my life; and if there is one thing that makes me enjoy my favorite sport more than anything else, it’s FIFA. The one game that I look forward to every year is this one. The FIFA 2008 staff didn’t disappoint me. The presentation: minimal to no flaws. The gameplay: significantly better and more challenging. The satisfaction: rewarding.

*Game review based upon XBOX 360 version.

Presentation: If there is one attribute that FIFA does not lack, it is the presentation. Year after year, EA Sports continues to deliver the most fashionable soccer game out there. Gameplay aside for the moment, FIFA always provides gamers with more authenticity than any other sports game on the market. To me, licensing is important. If I would like to play with Manchester United, I would also like to play with their actual jerseys and player names. Another soccer game out there does not feature that and quite frankly, I won’t even consider buying it for reasons like that. FIFA offers 621 licensed teams with 15,000 players. If you did your math from last year, that’s a 20% increase.

Upon turning on the game, you can still enjoy messing around with your favorite player on the menu screen(one of my favorite parts of the game). One presentation flaw? The graphic which shows the score, time and teams in the upper left corner of the screen is horrid. You can’t tell which teams are playing in the game because the logos for each team are about the size of a grain of salt.

Also, the faces for certain players are hit and miss. Major stars have easily recognizable faces but a player like, say, Fabio Grosso, has a shaved head in the game when he clearly doesn’t. I know it takes a lot of time to sort out the features of every player but some of the characteristics on certain faces do not match at all. Other than the usual presentation features, FIFA remains clean and crisp graphically.

Gameplay: When I take a look at the gameplay compared to past and previous years there is a major difference this year that stands out: It is really hard to score. In year’s past, FIFA has become more technical and it requires solid play to score goals. In this year’s version that is overwhelmingly viewable. I know every loves to score a lot of goals and run up the score, but let’s face it people: a good amount of soccer games do not see the total goal margin eclipse 4-5 goals. FIFA recognizes this and puts the gamer in a position to execute their tactics and skills. There is no more taking the ball into the box with one player and shooting it past a diving keeper. You must execute or you won’t score. Don’t force passes throughout the midfield either. Opposing defenders and midfielders will shut you down and create a counterattack. If you have a guy that is in behind a defender, don’t try feeding him a through ball because it will get swallowed up. And for anyone that relied on the deflection from the goalie, you can forget about that happening this year. I would say that 90% of the time, keepers either punch, knock, or deflect the ball either out of bounds for a corner or out the box to the midfield.

Remember when it was really easy to score a free kick from outside the box? You could determine the ball spin as the ball appeared on the screen before the kick and most of the time, you were going to score a curling free kick goal. It’s become tougher to put one past the keeper and the wall. Players can select the rotation of the ball by pointing the D-Pad in a certain direction, but it hardly works.

If you would like to improve your game tremendously, I would highly recommend playing the challenge modes. These modes allow you to play with certain teams from a certain region against other teams from that section. The challenges encourage you to achieve specific obstacles within the game. Examples? Complete 20 long passes with a certain player, score two goals in one half with a certain player, make 15 sliding tackles with your team without getting a yellow card, etc. This allows you to focus on one part of your game in the match.

Conclusion: I applaud the producers of this marvelous game. FIFA 2008 did it right because they account for what real soccer is about. Yes people, it is really hard to score, but thats what the beautiful game is all about. Every goal is an achievement in this game. It displays hard word and execution that paid off.

Sportable would personally like to thank EA Sports for their generosity once again in sending us the game. Their generosity is much appreciated. I am addicted to the game and I’m finding it tough to put down the sticks each and every night. If you have any questions about the game, feel free to ask. I’ll will be more than happy to answer them for you.